The Social History of Smoking

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. Dekker tells us of an apothecary and his wife who had no customers resorting to their shop "for any phisicall stuffe," but whose shop had many frequenters in the shape of gentlemen who "came to take their pipes of the divine smoake." That tobacco was often the mo

approbation. His shop is the Randevous of spitting, where men dialogue with their noses, and their communication is smoake. It is the place onely where Spaine is commended, and prefer'd before England itselfe. He should be well experienc'd in

n the character of "A Drunkard" he says: "Tobacco serves to aire him after a washing [i.e. a drinking-bout], and is his onely breath, and breathing while." In another, a tavern "is

and silver tongs with which the hot charcoal could be lifted to light the customer's pipe. The maple block was in constant use in those days, when the many present forms of prepared tobacco and varied mixtures

red for use. In that delightful book of pictures and gossip concerning old household and farming gear, and old-fashioned domestic plenishings of many kinds, called "Old West Surrey," Miss Jekyll figures two pairs of old ember-or brand-tongs. One of these quite deserves the praise which she bestows upon it. "Its lines," says Miss Jekyll, "fill one with the satisfaction caused by a thing that is exactly right, and with admiration for the art and skill of a true artist." These homely tongs are fashioned with a fine eye for symmetry, and, indeed

and applying it to the pipe-bowl; but the old ember-tongs are seldom seen. They may still be found in some farmhouses and country cottages, which have not been raided by the agent

il and the lees of sack, the increase of its weight by other artificial additions to its moisture, washing it in muscadel and grains, keeping it in greased leather and oiled rags buried

"The best in the town," says mine host, after the manner of his class. "Boy, dry a leaf." Quietly the boy tells him, "There's none in the house, sir," to which the worthy host replie

w Fair, in Ben Jonson's play of that name, says to her assistant: "Threepence a pipe-full I will have made,

h suche as are troubled with the shortnesse of winde, and fetche their breath thicke or often, and do [sic] breake without daunger the impostems of the breast." The leaves of coltsfoot and of other plants have often been used as a substitute for tobacco in modern days. A correspondent of Notes and Queries, in 1897, said that when he was a boy he knew an ol

house as wine, ale, or beer. He goes on to say that apothecaries' shops, grocers' shops, and chandlers' shops were (almost) never without company who from morning to night were still taking tobacco; and what a number there are besides, he adds, "that doe keepe houses, set open shoppes, that have no other trade to live by but by the selling of tobacco." Rich says he had been told that a list had been recently made of all the houses that traded in tobacco in and near about

ch-enemy of tobacco-that is, by 1620, the Society of Tobacco-pipe-makers had become so very numerous and considerable a body that they were incorpora

lled Tobacco, or Nicotiana, is growne so frequent in use and of such price, that many, nay, the most part, with an insatiable desire doe take of it, drawing into their mouth the smoke thereof, which is of a strong scent, through a

udges of Serjeants Inn whose chambers are near adjoyning." Two other men, one of them hailing from the notorious Ram Alley, were presented "for annoying the Judges at Serjeants Inn with the stench and smell of their tobacco," which looks as if the Judges were of King James's mind about smoking. The same Register of 1630 records the presentment of two men of the same family name-Thomas Bouringe and Philip Bouringe-"for keeping open their shops and selling tobacco at unlawful hours, and having disorderly people in their house to the

he Chamber. 'Whereas his Ma^tie to prevent the excesse of the use of Tobacco, and to set an order to those that regrate and sell or utter it by retayle, who observe noe reasonable rates or prizes [prices], nor take care that it be wholsome for men's bodyes that shall use it,' has caused letters to be sent to the chief Officer

2 of persons within the Hundred of Milverton and Kingsbury West thought fit to sell tobacco by retail; a

a pot of beer "wanting in measure, contrary to the law," and another sovereign from William Howlyns for a like offence. This is right and intelligible enough; but on another occasion in the same year each of these men, who presumably were ale-house keepers, had to pay 30s.-a substantial sum con

onies the use of the "creature called Tobacko" was by no means encouraged. In Connecticut a man was permitted by the law to smoke once if he went on a journey

hods of inhaling and exhaling the smoke of tobacco. A singular feature of the enthusiasm for tobacco

in his "Every Man out of his Humour," 1600, describes one Sogliardo as "an essential clown ... yet so enamoured of the name of a gentleman that he will have it though he buys it. He comes up every term to learn to take tobacco and see new motions." Sogliardo was accustomed to hire a private room to practise in. The

ch any young gentleman newly come into his inheritance, who wishes to be as exactly qualified as the best of the ordinary-hunting gallants are-"to entertain the most gentlemanlike use of tobacco; as first, to give it the most exquisite perfume; then t

nd "ebullition," as applied with burlesque intent to rapid smoking-the vapour bubbling rapidly from the pipe-bowl-is intelligible enough, but why Cuban? "Euripus" was the name, in ancient geography, of the channel between Eub?a (Negropont) and the mainland-a passage which was celebrated for the violenc

early smokers acquired the art of emitting the smoke throu

ace, not only tilting properly so called, but rope-walking performances, bear- and bull-baiting, dancing and other diversions which her Majesty held in high favour. Consequently the Tiltyard was constantly the scene of courtly gatherings; and if smoking were permitted on such occasions-as Shift's boasting promises would appear to indicate-then it may be reasonably inferred that Queen Elizabeth did not

d in those days to be "good for" a surprising variety of ailments and diseases; but to explore that little section of popular medicine would be foreign to my purpose. Burton believed in tobacco as medicine; but with regard to habitual smoking he was a worthy follower of King James, the strength of whose language he sought to emulate

in respect of many other matters of interest, was himself an enemy of tobacco. He politely refers to "that great Tobacconist, the Prince of Smoake and Darkness, Don Plut

g of wounds, cuts, sores and so on, by external application, but thinks little of its use for any other purpose. Like others of his school, he attacks the "licentious Tobacconists [smokers] who spend and consume, not only their time, but also their health, wealth, and witts in taking of this loathsome and unsavorie fume." He admits the popularity of the herb, but expresses his own personal objection to the "detestable savour or smack that it leaveth behind upon the taking of it"; from which one is inclined to surmise that the doctor's first pipe was not an entire success. With an evident desire to be fair, Venner, notwithstanding his dislike of the "savour," refuses to condemn tobacco utterly,

rary to the order and way I have set down." It is a dreadful list which may possibly have frightened a few

there is nothing which is not medicine, the root, the stalke, the leaves, the seeds, the smoake, the ashes." The doctor gives sundry directions for administering tobacco-"to be used in infusion, in decoction, in substance, in smoke, in salt." But Barclay clearly does not sympathize with its indiscriminate use for pleasure. "As concerning the smoke," he says, "it may be taken more frequently, and for the said effects, but always fasting, and with emptie stomack, not as the English abusers do, w

Solomon, King James I. Their titles are characteristic of their style. A writer named Deacon published in 1616 a quarto entitled "Tobacco tortured in the filthy Fumes of Tobacco refined"; but Joshua Sylvester had easily surpassed this when he wrote his "Tobacco Battered and the Pipe

publike State." Much may be forgiven, however, to the introducer of so charming a term of abuse as "profluvious." Deacon's book takes the form of a dialogue, and after nearly 200 pages of argument, in which the unfortunate herb gets no mercy, one of the interlocutors, a trader in

ber and honest conversation, no tippler or haunter of alehouses, no puffer of tobacco." A worthy Derbyshire man named Campbell, in his will dated 20 October 1616, left all his household goods to his son, "on this condition that yf at any time hereafter, any of his brothers o

1639. Walton says that Wotton obtained relief to some extent from asthma by leaving off smoking

was written in glorification of the medicinal and therapeutic properties of tobacco,

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e will steale it from his father; a good fellow, for he will give the smoake to a beggar; a niggard, for he will not part with his box to an Emperor!" A character in one of Chapman's plays, 1606, calls tobacco "the gentleman's saint and the soldier's idol." A little-known bard of 1630-Barten

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testimonials and denunciations, especially the latter, from writers of the early decades of the seventeenth century. Perhaps the most curious thing in connexion with the immense number of allus

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sumed that he